


my past has tasted bitter for years now

by buckybunnyteeth



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Friendship, Gen, Missing Scene, Repairing Relationships, coda; s3e07, spoilers for ep. killer frost, spoilers for s3e07
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-23
Updated: 2016-11-23
Packaged: 2018-09-01 17:53:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8632735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/buckybunnyteeth/pseuds/buckybunnyteeth
Summary: Barry decides to leave before Cisco can kick him out.





	

“I guess you can be yourself, whatever that means- the best and worst of you, and they love you anyway. You can fight, but even when you’re mad at them, you know they’re not going to stop being your friend.” -Jennifer Niven (All the Bright Places).

…

Barry leaves Caitlin asleep on the couch and Cisco in the kitchen to go to his room and stat collecting his things. He goes at normal human speed. He tells himself it’s because his leg still hurts. It’s a lie, but it’s a good enough lie to keep the tears at bay.

“What are you doing?”

Barry jumps at Cisco’s sudden appearance in the door way. He’s holding two cups of coffee.

He stumbles over his own words before he can form an adequate sentence.

“I’m just, uh, packing up my stuff.”

Cisco rolls his eyes and puts down the mugs to cross his arms, obviously frustrated. Obviously still angry. He’s always frustrated at Barry these days, and frankly Barry thinks he is getting off lightly. 

“Why?”

Barry winces. He knew that he should never have accepted Cisco’s offer to stay here. He knew he was still mad, had every right to be mad. But Barry was also weak to spending time with his best friend.

“I-” Barry sighs and looks away back to the bag he is packing, “I just know how it felt having to look at Wells- um Eobard- every day after I found out-“

“Barry.”

“-It was just so hard, and it’s still so hard-”

He’s been seeing yellow flickers every time he looks in the mirror.

“-and I just, I mean I don’t want to have to put you through anything like that! I care about you and I would never want to cause you pain. A-anymore than I already have. I-”

“You don’t have a job anymore how are you going to afford a new place? Stop being an idiot-”

“-I’m gonna hole up back at the Lab,” Barry steam rolls on, barely hearing Cisco’s words, “- which I probably should be doing regardless seeing as I’m training Wally. I’m the Flash full time now, it just makes sense to live there, so there’s no commute, no suspicious neighbours, and I can be the first to respond to any threat. Plus I have to help train Wally now-”

“Barry!”

Barry jumps. He hadn’t noticed Cisco coming to stand next to him. He looks so young in his baggy sleep pants, and with his wide watery eyes. 

Oh god, Barry thinks, I’ve made him cry. Again. 

“You don’t have to go,” Cisco says in a whisper.

Oh no, now Barry’s eyes feel watery. 

“Cisco, I-”

“You’re not him,” Cisco tells him firmly, quietly, hand coming up to tightly grip his arm, “Okay? You. Are. Not. Him.”

Barry swallows around the tightness in his throat. He hates that Cisco is comforting him right now. Hates that he’s selfish enough to lean into the touch. He should be screaming at him, throwing things. Should be spitting venomous words, not trying to pull Barry back from the edge of a full on panic attack. 

“You don’t have to go.” Cisco says again, voice so quiet he can hardly hear it even in the silent apartment. Barry can hear Caitlin’s soft snores from here.

“I really do.” Barry croaks back, “I’m just hurting you by being here.”

Cisco grits his teeth and his eyes spark with anger.

“You don’t get to tell me what I need, Barry.”

A tear slips lose from Barry’s eye before he can stop it and suddenly Cisco’s face drops from anger to surprise.

“You- I need to go, Cisco,” Barry admits, “I don’t-”

Barry feels so selfish. He feels like a raw nerve. The old fear of everyone he loves dying or leaving him has been creeping back under his skin since he got back from Flashpoint and if he stays here with Cisco it’s just going to become more and more obvious that’s he’s broken. He needs to be alone. He needs to learn how to live like this, as a exposed nerve. So nothing like this can ever happen again. 

Cisco, Caitlin, neither of them deserve him as a burden. He’s taken too much from them already. 

“-This is just something that needs to happen,” Barry finishes weakly, “It … it’s better for everyone if I’m gone.”

He turns away, back to his mostly packed bag, just so he doesn’t have to look at Cisco’s conflicted face anymore. The face full of frustration and sadness, and Barry can’t stomach that maybe both of those emotions are for him. 

Cisco doesn’t argue. He turns on his heel and walks back out of Barry’s room. 

It’s not his room anymore. It should never have been his room. 

Barry packs the rest of his bag in silence. The only sounds are Caitlin’s soft breathes from the other room and the light taps on the window as it begins to rain outside.

He leaves his more cumbersome stuff behind, planning on coming back later when Cisco is out so he can spirit them away. He wonders what to do with his work kit. Singh let him keep it because of how much he customized it … but Barry can’t even bring himself to look at it. That’s becoming a trend in his life, he realizes.

He throws his last shirt into the duffle bag, zips it and hauls it over his shoulder. He walks through the living room on the way out to check on Caitlin. She looks so much more peaceful in sleep. Looks like she did before Barry screwed up her whole life. He doesn’t look into the kitchen where he knows Cisco is standing, head bowed as he braces himself against the kitchen island. 

Barry has his hand on the doorknob when Cisco calls out after him. 

“Barry.”

He hums in reply, not trusting his voice not to crack.

“Just- … don’t stay gone.”

Barry leans his head against the door, tears slipping out without his permission. 

“Okay.”

The stand there in silent limbo for an unfathomable amount of time. Then Barry squares his shoulders and super speeds out of there.

He doesn’t sleep that night.

Or any night for the next two weeks.

He doesn’t go back for his things and Cisco doesn’t burn them in the street. 

It’s the loudest silent ‘maybe someday’ he’s ever heard in his life.

**Author's Note:**

> angst. its been absent recently. i just needed to write this. i saw a post about Cisco burning Barrys shirts on the lawn and it was funny, but it also formed this scene in my head. after all no one hates barry allen as much as barry allen hates barry allen


End file.
